[Archive]

Posted By: Bruce Moreland

This all boils down to whether or not you think that he's doing a test auction, or whether you think that there is either a sane reserve on the card or he's going to try to sell it to the high bidder(s) if the reserve isn't met.

If it meets the reserve, we'll all know what is going on, and if it doesn't, we won't.

There is also the question of whether the item could legally be on eBay, regardless of whether the reserve is reachable or not. I think that the question comes down to whether Dr. Koss would be legally required to disclose the alterations if he sold that card.

I don't know the truth of that. It is almost certain that eBay will not shut down this auction, and that any other attempt to get to the heart of this before the auction ends will be too late.

If the auction ends with reserve not met, it will be hard to argue that anything illegal may have transpired, since the auction results are not binding, and in fact according to eBay rules the buyer and seller aren't even allowed to contact each other.

Let's remove eBay from this for a moment. Do you think that Dr. Koos would legally be able to put a picture of this on his web page, with no description, and the line, "For sale, best offer"?

If it is legal for him to run this auction, then I think he is fine, since we don't know his motives.

bruce